What Mark Hughes said on Hartlepool United as Pools suffer Bradford City defeat

Pools suffered their first home defeat of the campaign thanks to a second half double from Bantams striker Andy Cook, having fought back into the game through David Ferguson’s first goal of the season in the first half.

Ferguson was on hand to cash in at the back post from Jake Hastie’s cross to cancel out Scott Banks’ early opener for the away side before Cook struck twice in the final 25 minutes to take the contest away from Paul Hartley’s side.

The result leaves Pools without a win this season, having taken two points from their opening five league games, with Hartley left frustrated by what he described as 'basic errors' in defence to allow the Bantams to find the back of the net on three occasions to claim all three points.

But visiting boss Hughes was pleased by his side's efforts at the Suit Direct Stadium after claiming their second win of the season.

“I thought we were excellent. We got our noses in front, [but] we probably didn’t keep the lead for long enough,” Hughes told Bradford’s official club website.

“We talked about getting the early goal and controlling the game from that point, but in fairness to them they reacted.

“Second half I thought we were excellent in terms of really understanding what was required. We stood up to the physicality and put balls into good areas.”

Hughes added: “Away from home, at times, we’re probably a little bit guilty of playing like the home side. That is OK, because it shows you can dominate.

“But on occasions, you have to say to them ‘what you have got’ and ‘can you hurt us’ and we did that in the second half and the answer was they didn’t really have any real momentum to their play and didn’t really have us under any sustained pressure and, as a consequence, we were able to see the game out quite comfortably.”